Artist: Sun Ra
Album: Pink Elephants on Parade
Genre: Avant-Garde Jazz, Space-Age
Label: Modern Harmonic
Released: 2024
Quality: FLAC (tracks+.cue)
Tracklist:
- The Forest of No Return (3:12)
- Someday My Prince Will Come (6:23)
- Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah (6:46)
- Let's Go Fly a Kite (6:17)
- Second Star to the Right (10:25)
- Pink Elephants on Parade (4:01)
- Whistle While You Work (7:18)
- Wishing Well (6:29)
- Never Never Land (5:19)
- Second Star to the Right (alternate) (4:15)
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Sun Ra aficionados are well aware of the storied bandleader's late-career obsession with Disney movies -- by the end of the 1980s, the Arkestra was performing entire concerts of songs from vintage Disney films, with costumes to match. However, this period was strangely under-documented, with the only studio recording of the material being a rousing take on Dumbo's "Pink Elephants on Parade" for Hal Willner's Disney tribute Stay Awake. A posthumous CD, Second Star to the Right (Salute to Walt Disney), presented an audience recording of an all-Disney 1989 gig in Austria, and other tracks from this period have trickled out on various releases and bootlegs. Modern Harmonic's 2024 set Pink Elephants on Parade gathers Disney covers from various Arkestra concerts between 1985 and 1990, most of which had never been released. The Arkestra's whimsical, freewheeling spirit matches the material, particularly on boisterous singalongs like "Let's Go Fly a Kite" and "Whistle While You Work." "The Forest of No Return" is equal parts spooky and silly, and this reading of "Pink Elephants on Parade" is more unhinged than the studio version. "Someday My Prince Will Come," long known as a jazz standard in its own right, is played relatively straightforward, though there is some abrasive saxophone wailing near the end. June Tyson leads Peter Pan's "Never Never Land," which starts out sincere if a bit ramshackle, then gets blown apart halfway by a noisy, bugged-out synth solo, which seems to astound even the band themselves, as they barely try to keep up with it. "Second Star to the Right," a title Sun Ra himself could've come up with, is presented in two takes, one lasting for ten minutes. Both are pretty easygoing, helping the listener float away into the night and encouraging them to follow their dreams. Pink Elephants on Parade is an excellent reminder of how purely fun and entertaining Sun Ra's music can be. It's also the most family-friendly Sun Ra release by far, and a good way to introduce children to jazz.
Review by Paul Simpson